Cosmic Workings In Earth and Man

On Poisonous Substances and Their Effects

Schmidt Number: S-5580

On-line since: 15th December, 2009

VI

ON
POISONOUS SUBSTANCES AND THEIR EFFECTS

I have told you
that man must be regarded as a being who consists not only of the
physical body that is visible to the eye, but also of higher members
— invisible bodies. The first invisible member, the ether body,
is a much finer, more delicate body and cannot be perceived by the
ordinary senses. It is the source of life
not only in man, but also in the plants and
animals. Another higher member is the astral body which enables man
to have feelings and perceptions. He has this body in common with the
animals, for they too have an astral body. But man has something
which the animal has not, namely, self-consciousness,
“I” consciousness. Man, then, consists of the
visible physical body and of three higher members: ether body, astral
body and the “I.”

When it is said,
as the result of super-sensible perception, that these higher members
are a reality in man, a good way of convincing oneself that
such a statement is well-founded — there are other ways too, of
course — is to study the effects of poisonous substances upon
the human organism.

In
speaking about the insects recently, we heard
that in certain circumstances insect poison can have an extremely
beneficial effect, that it actually counteracts certain illnesses.
Most medicaments, indeed, are prepared from substances which,
in the ordinary way, are poisons. They must, of course, be taken in
the proper dosage, that is to say, they must be prepared as
medicaments in such a way that they have the right
effect upon the human organism.

Every poison has
its own specific way of working. Arsenic is sometimes used to destroy
rats and is a very strong poison. When a human being takes arsenic,
or when arsenic is given to an animal, death either occurs
immediately or if, by administering the appropriate antidote one
succeeds in warding off death by expelling the arsenic, a kind of
slow arsenical illness may set in and become gradually worse. If in
his occupation a man is handling something of which arsenic is an
ingredient, these tiny quantities of arsenic may give rise to
arsenical poisoning as an occupational disease. When a man takes
arsenic in a quantity insufficient to cause death, when he takes only
a little but nevertheless enough to be injurious, then he gets pale
and thin, has a chalky look about him and his body gradually
deteriorates. He loses the natural freshness of his complexion and
also the fatness that denotes a healthy state of the body. And so
even if the effect of the arsenic is slow, the body gradually
deteriorates.

But there is
another side to the matter. There are valleys in the Austrian Alps,
for example, where the stones and rocks contain arsenic. The people
living there begin by taking tiny quantities of arsenic without any
ill effects at all. They begin with minute quantities and then
increase them — with the strange result that after some time
their bodies can stand a considerable amount. Why do they take the
arsenic? In most cases it is for reasons of vanity! They have an idea
that the arsenic will give the skin a good colour; if they were once
skinny and emaciated they get plump. They take the arsenic for
vanity's sake, their bodies get accustomed to it and their
complexions improve.

There you have a
very striking contradiction! Such contradictions are to be found not
only in human thinking — which as a rule is full of them
— but in nature too. At one time the effect of the arsenic is
that a man wastes away and his skin (not his hair) gets grey. Yet at
another time arsenic is taken for the very purpose of improving
the complexion! It is a complete contradiction.

What
is the explanation? When science speaks of
matters like this, we are told: There is no explanation, it simply is
so. And indeed it cannot be explained if nothing is known about the
super-sensible bodies of man! As I have told you, it is necessary for
the human being to have formic acid in him all the time — and
the same applies to arsenic. Man actually produces it in his own
organism. This may seem surprising, but as I said to you once, it is
not correct to state that a man can live without alcohol. He can, of
course, live without drinking
alcohol ... but without alcohol he cannot live.
For even if he drinks no alcohol, his own body produces inwardly the
quantity that is necessary to keep him alive. He produces in himself
all the substances that are essential to his life. What he takes or
receives from outside is merely a support, a stimulus. In reality,
man himself produces the substances he needs, drawing them from the
Cosmos into his organism. All such substances are present in the
Cosmos in a state of fine and very delicate distribution —
iron, for example, Man does not only take in the iron with his
breathing; it also makes its way into the body through the eyes and
ears. The iron that a man actually consumes is merely a support, a
supplement, and most of it is subsequently excreted. If as human
beings we were not obliged to live on the earth between birth and
death and to cope with earthly affairs, it would be unnecessary for
us to eat at all, for we could draw our sustenance from the universe.
But when we have manual work to do, when we have to move about, we
need the support of this extra iron, for the body itself does not
produce a sufficient quantity.

Man
produces arsenic in his organism all the
time; so does the animal. The plant does not. And why? Because the
plant has only an ether body and it is the astral body
that produces arsenic. Man and animal,
therefore, produce arsenic inwardly. Now what is the purpose of the
arsenic? You see, if man were not able to produce arsenic in his
organism, he would be incapable of feeling or perception; he would
gradually lapse into a plant-like existence. He would begin, first of
all, to be dreamy, and finally, he would go about in a state of utter
drowsiness. The arsenic in his organism enables him to be wide-awake,
to have feelings and perceptions. When I press my hand on something I
not only squeeze the skin but I also feel
something. And the reason why this feeling
arises is that my astral body is producing arsenic all the time.

A
man who takes arsenic strengthens the activity
of the astral body. The consequence is that the astral body asserts
itself all over the organism; it becomes excessively strong, seizes
hold of all the organs and rots them away. That is what happens in
rapid arsenical poisoning. If anyone takes a great deal of arsenic
all at once, the astral body begins to be powerful to an alarming
degree; it surges and swirls and finally destroys the activity of the
whole organism. It drives the life
out of the organs, for within the human being a perpetual
battle is and must be in process between the astral body and the
ether body. The ether body gives life; the astral body gives
feeling, perception (awareness). But feeling and awareness
cannot arise unless the life is suppressed. There is perpetual battle
between the astral body and the ether body. If the ether body has the
upper hand we become a little sleepy; if the astral body has the
upper hand we become intensely wide-awake. Actually these conditions
alternate in waking life, only the alternation is so rapid that it is
not noticed and we think we are wide-awake all the time. In reality
there is a constant swing: waking, sleeping; waking, sleeping. And
what the astral body needs in order to be able to work down in the
right way is provided by the amount of arsenic produced inwardly by
the human being himself.

If arsenic is
introduced from outside in excessive quantity, the astral body
becomes suddenly very strong — so strong that it destroys the
life in the ether body. The man can no longer live; he dies.

But if someone
takes an amount of arsenic which makes the astral body only a little
too strong, then the limbs and the inner organs gradually lose flesh
and the man gets thin and has a greyish complexion, because the inner
organs are not functioning in the right way. If he is given a very
tiny quantity of arsenic, or if he is in the habit of taking such a
quantity himself (in the latter case one will not give him any more
because he is taking it already) then the astral body begins to be
just a little lively; it stimulates the organs and the effect is just
the reverse. If, from the beginning, too much arsenic has been given,
the astral body destroys the organs; if only a little is given, the
organs are stimulated just as they are stimulated by spice. If the
dose is increased very gradually, the organs are able to stand it.
The man begins to look healthier, to put on flesh, because his astral
body is more active than it was before, when he was taking no arsenic.

But now think of
someone who was once in the habit of taking arsenic and then is
obliged to stop. In such a case his astral body ceases to be active,
because the stimulus given by the arsenic is missing. The result will
be a rapid deterioration in his health. And so a person who begins to
take arsenic and then increases the doses to a certain point, becomes
dependent upon it and must continue to take it until his death. That
is where the mischief lies: the arsenic cannot be dispensed with and
such people are dependent upon it all their lives. The only other
possible course — unfortunately it very seldom succeeds —
would be to take less and less by gradual degrees. But what usually
happens is the story all over again of the peasant who thought that
by applying this theory he would get an ox out of the habit of
eating. He gave the ox less and less fodder and although it became
very thin, it went on living; finally he gave it a single stalk, and
then it died. Nevertheless the peasant was still convinced that if
the ox had been able to do without this last stalk, it would still be
alive. It is just the same with people who are supposed to be getting
rid of the habit of taking arsenic. They collapse before they reach
the point of being able to do without the final quantity.

Man's astral
body needs arsenic and it is remarkable to see science groping its
way about — for that is what is happening! We constantly hear,
for example, that somewhere or other a remedy for syphilis has been
discovered. You may have read in the newspapers a few days ago that a
remedy for syphilis has been discovered in Paris. Now none of those
who make these tentative experiments really know to what syphilis is
due. Syphilis is due to the fact that the physical body has become
excessively active and the astral body cannot take hold of it. But
the scientists concerned do not know this and so they try things out
experimentally Strangely enough, all these medicaments contain
arsenic! If you go into the matter you will find that this is the
case, although these things can only be explained by Spiritual
Science. Arsenic is an ingredient of all these remedies, but the
essentials are not known and people are groping in the dark. In many
ways this is characteristic of modern science. It is realised, of
course, that something happens in the human being when a medicament
containing arsenic is administered; but what is not known is that the
activity of the astral body is enhanced and that the excessive
activity of the physical body is reduced by the administration of a
solution of arsenic. Real insight into the nature of man — that
is what a new science of medicine must help to promote; for then and
only then will healing in the true sense of the word be possible.

And now to return
to the subject of poisonous substances in general. There are mineral
poisons, one of which is arsenic; copper, lead, phosphorus, tartar
emetic, certain pulverised stones — these are all mineral
poisons.

There are also
plant poisons, for example, belladonna; also digitalis which comes
from the red foxglove.

Thirdly, there are
animal poisons — insect poisons, snake poisons. These include
the very terrible poison of rabies, coming from a mad
dog.

Distinction must
therefore be made between mineral poisons, plant poisons and animal
poisons. Each of them has a different effect. Take, for example,
mineral substances like lead or copper — they all have
poisonous effects; or sulphuric acid, nitric acid, phosphorus, etc.
Such poisons can really only be studied when they have not been taken
in quantities sufficient to cause immediate death. A strong
dose of mineral poison kills the human being; weaker doses make him
ill. And the most important thing of all is to be able accurately to
observe how strong the effect of a poison must be to make a man ill.
It is when the effects are only slight that we can best study how the
poison works. And if illness is present, the right dose may succeed
in restoring health.

When a man has
taken a mineral poison — let us say, arsenic, or copper, or
lead — the symptoms are severe nausea, retching, vomiting, pain
in the stomach, violent colic and pains in the intestines. The human
body tries all the time only to take in substances that it can really
absorb and digest. That is why there is retching and vomiting the
moment a man has taken a mineral poison. This is the self-defence put
up by the body, but in most cases it is inadequate and then antidotes
must be administered; we must see to it that an antidote with which
the poison unites is introduced into the stomach and the intestines.
If the poison gets into the stomach and the intestines, it takes hold
of the body. But if an antidote is administered, poison and antidote
unite and then the poison does not take hold of the body because it
has wedded itself, so to speak, with the antidote. And then a strong
emetic or purgative must be given.

What
are the antidotes for slight mineral
poisonings? Discussion of severe poisonings must, of course, be
confined to medical circles. In cases of slight mineral poisoning a
good antidote is immediately to swallow lukewarm water into which an
egg has been beaten; in this way, fluid albumen reaches the
stomach and the intestines. The
poison unites with this fluid albumen and can be got rid of by
vomiting or diarrhoea. When the poisoning is very slight, the same
result can be achieved with tepid milk or also with certain oils
extracted from plants. These are antidotes for mineral poisons
— with the exception of phosphorus poisoning. If
someone has been poisoned with phosphorus, plant-oils must not
be given because they actually enhance the
poisonous effect of the phosphorus. But all other mineral substances
can be made to unite with oils, and then expelled.

What
actually happens when there is poison in
the stomach? Think of what I have just said. An egg has been beaten
into lukewarm water and this surrounds the poison in the stomach. All
the poisons I have named are also produced by the human organism
itself. The human organism produces in itself a little lead, copper,
phosphorus. Man produces within his organism all kinds of substances,
but these substances must be produced in exactly the quantity
required by the body. If lead is introduced, the body then contains
too much lead. So we must ask: What is the function of lead in the
human organism? If the body produced no lead, we should all be going
about with rickets! Our bones would be flabby and soft. A rachitic
child is one whose organism produces too little lead. The human body
must contain neither too much nor too little lead. As a general
rule the constitution of man is such that he produces the substances
he needs in sufficient quantities. If he does not produce them he
gets ill. Very well, then, if lead is introduced into the organism,
what happens? What happens to the lead that man produces
inwardly all the time? Just think of it. Even in childhood you begin
to produce lead in your bodies. But lead can really never be found in
the body in any perceptible quantity because it is immediately
sweated out. If it were not sweated out, you would, as quite young
children, have within you so much lead that its presence could be
demonstrated; and as grown-ups, far from having soft bones, you would
be going about with bones so hard and brittle that if knocked at any
point they would fall to pieces. And so this tiny quantity of lead
which the human being has within him, is all the time being produced
and then sweated out. But if an excessive quantity finds its way into
the body, it cannot immediately be sweated out again and it becomes a
destructive agent. Very well — now we give water containing
albumen. This is a deterrent to the injurious effects of the lead.
And why? The reason why I am unable to sweat out the lead
I have myself produced is that I also have albumen in my body. And
when a baby is drinking the lukewarm mother's milk, one of the
effects of this milk is that the child gets accustomed to sweat out
the lead. Therefore lukewarm milk can also be given in a case of
slight lead poisoning, and then the lead is induced to leave the
body, either through vomiting or through sweating. The very last
vestiges must always be got rid of by sweating.

So
you see, man imitates what nature is doing
all the time. The albumen that is always present in the human being
dissolves the lead. If, therefore, I introduce too much lead into the
stomach and then add albumen, I am really doing what the body is
doing all the time. The effects of these mineral poisons must be
nullified by something that contains life. It must always be
something that has life,
either albumen-water — the egg comes from the hen and has life
— or lukewarm milk which has come from the cow and has life; or
oils that come from the plants and have life. One must give something
that contains life, something that still contains etheric life. And
so, when there is mineral poisoning, the physical body is cured by
means of the ether body.
In cases of mineral poisoning the physical body
is sending its forces with excessive strength into the ether body.
Therefore we can say: mineral poisons cause the physical body to be
active in the ether body, to make its way, somewhere in the organs,
into the ether body. So you see, if I have too much lead in me and it
is not got rid of by its antidote but passes over into the body, then
immediately the whole physical body is driven into the ether
body. The physical body is a dead body, the ether body is a body
of life. But the ether body is killed by the physical
body when the latter is driven into it with too much force.

If I have copper
poisoning and do not at once succeed in rendering it innocuous
in the stomach by an antidote, it passes on into the abdomen where
the physical body proceeds to make too much headway into the ether
body. Again there are injurious effects. All mineral poisons cause
the physical body to trespass into the ether body. If I now give the
antidote, something that derives from the ether body — albumen
water, lukewarm milk and the like — the physical body is driven
out of the ether body. Here we can see with exactitude what kind of
processes go on in the human body.

And
now what is there to say about plant
poisons? When the poison is that of belladonna, or henbane, or
digitalis, or thorn-apple, or some such plant, the following happens.
Mineral poisons cause vomiting; the stomach and
intestines are cast into tumult. But when plant poisons have been
taken ... and taken in large quantities, alcohol and opium too work
as plant poisons ... then things do not remain at the stage of nausea
or vomiting, but the whole of the body is affected. With plant
poisoning, hardly anything, to begin with, happens in the stomach,
but lower down, in the intestines, diarrhoea sets in. Whereas mineral
poisons give rise more to vomiting, plant poisons give rise more to
diarrhoea, but there are further effects. The body swells up, becomes
bluish, cramps and convulsions occur; the pupil of the eye expands,
or it may also contract, as in opium poisoning, when it becomes tiny;
in cases of other plant poisons the pupil is very much enlarged.
These plant poisons take a deeper hold of the body. Mineral poisons
only take hold of the physical body; plant poisons, because they
derive from life, from ether substance, take hold of the
ether body. And so we may say: plant poisons cause the ether body to
trespass into the astral body. The process goes still more deeply
into the body. Whereas mineral poisons drive the physical body at
some point into the ether body, into the realm of life, plant poisons
drive the life
into the astral body — the realm of feeling, of perception.
The consequence is that the person concerned is stupefied, feeling is
dulled and deadened and the eyes, the very organs through which he is
able to have fine and delicate perceptions, are attacked; the pupils
enlarge or contract; the skin which is the organ of touch, is
affected. Plant poisonings, you see, go more deeply into the body.
And now, just as mineral poison is driven out of the ether body by
something that derives from life, we must discover how the
plant poison may be thrown out of the astral body. And there we must
turn to plants in which the astral forces from the Cosmos,
from the universe, have already taken hold.

The
ordinary plants grow in the spring, last through the summer, wither
away in the autumn. But think of trees:
they do not wither away but live for a long,
long time. That is because the astral forces come to them from
outside and take a hold. In certain trees, this process is
particularly strong; such trees do not, of course, become animals,
for the plant-nature always predominates; but the astral forces take
a very strong hold, particularly in the bark. Trees surround
themselves with bark and the bark of oaks and willows
is the most potent because it is there that the
astral forces have taken the strongest hold. But all trees containing
tannic acid, as it is called, are trees in which the astral forces
have taken a strong hold. Consequently the juice that can be squeezed
or extracted by boiling from the bark of willows or oaks is a useful
antidote because with it one can drive out of the astral body what
has trespassed into it through the plant poison. To a certain extent,
too, both coffee and tea contain an acid of the kind that will help
to expel the injurious agent from the astral body. Strong coffee and
really good tea also have a counteracting effect upon plant poisons.
We can see now that to drink black coffee with our meals is by no
means a bad thing to do. Plants always contain poison in tiny
quantities and when we drink black coffee we drive out of the astral
body the injurious effects caused by the encroachment of the ether
body. And this drinking of black coffee really means that every time
we have introduced into the body something that makes it a little
unhealthy, we get rid of what was contained in the food and has made
too much headway into the astral body.

The
right time to drink tea is during
the taking of food because it actually works
more strongly then and takes the astral body in hand. If tea is drunk
during a meal it mingles with the digestive process and promotes
digestion in that it frees the astral body which is occupied with the
digestion. But if tea is drunk some time after a meal, it goes
directly to the astral body and makes it too lively, too
forceful.

Humanity
has had a certain very sound instinct.
The habit of drinking coffee fulfils a useful purpose, for it helps
the astral body to extricate itself from what may be an injurious
element. The body always has a slight tendency to develop poisons and
for that reason man needs the weak antidotes contained in coffee. You
know, too, that there are people who try to give a fillip to their
digestion not only with black coffee but by adding a little brandy to
the coffee. In the brandy itself there is something that works as a
plant poison and this makes the astral body inoperative. The ether
body becomes particularly strong when a man drinks brandy or any
spirit of that kind. He feels comfortable, because he lets
consciousness slip away he vegetates. When he imbibes strong spirits
he lets himself sink into a plant-like condition and he has the
feeling of comfort and well-being that is usually associated with
sleep. In sleep, however, he has no consciousness of this
well-being. If anyone were actually to feel a sense of wellbeing
during sleep it would be because he is aware of the activity of the
flesh. But in the ordinary way, when people are asleep they are
unconscious of comfort or well-being. When they drink brandy it is a
different matter because although they are awake the lower part of
the body is sleepy, and in this condition, while the head is awake,
they feel extremely comfortable. And so the drinking of spirits
promotes a sense of animal-plant-like well-being in man.

Thirdly, there are
the animal poisons: snake poison, different insect poisons, also
poisons like that produced in a dog with rabies. Snake poisoning
provides the best illustration here. If you are bitten by a snake,
the poison goes into the blood where it does untold harm. But if you
were to extract the poison from snakes and mix it with pepper or salt
into food ... only that would be a senseless thing to do because
snake poison has no taste ... I mean, if you were to do such a thing
for amusement, your stomach would not be seriously affected! In the
stomach it does not act as a poison. The same applies to other animal
poisons, insect poisons, for example. But the poison of rabies gets
into the saliva and from the saliva into the blood and
therefore if it did get into the stomach it would have certain
injurious effects, although nothing like as injurious as the poison
from the bite of a mad dog. Rabies poison passes from the saliva into
the blood. Speaking quite generally, therefore, it can be said that
animal poisons work primarily in the blood, not in the digestive
process.

When
digestion begins, the in-taken foodstuffs pass, first of all, into the
stomach — they are still physical, just as they were in the world
outside. Plant poisons derive from the ether body and therefore are
not entirely physical; they go more deeply into the body. All
foodstuffs eventually reach the blood. Snake poison can be digested
and when it passes from the digestion into the blood there are no ill
effects. Now when food is in the stomach, the physical body
is at work. When the food has reached the intestines, from then until
the point where it is to pass into the blood, the ether body
is at work; and the actual transition into the blood is brought about by
the astral body. But within the
blood, the Ego, the “I” is working. If, therefore, snake
poison enters the blood, this causes the astral body to trespass into
the field of the “I.” The effect of mineral poisons is
that the physical body trespasses into the ether body. Plant poisons
cause the ether body to trespass into the astral body. Animal poisons
cause the astral body to trespass into the field of the
“I.” Therefore with an animal poison the only thing to do
is to expel it from the blood itself; because the “I” is
the highest principle. The poison can only be expelled by something
that is actually in the blood. In a case of rabies poisoning,
therefore, the only thing to do is to take an animal and inject the
poison into its blood. If the animal dies ... well, the poison is the
cause of death; but if it does not die, then its blood is strong
enough to fight this poison. If the serum is then extracted and
injected into a human being who has rabies, something that is capable
of fighting the poison is added to his blood and in this way one may
possibly succeed in curing him This poison can only be got rid of by
the direct antidote, produced in the blood itself. This sheds light
on animal poisons in general. The human being himself produces slight
animal poisons all the time. The faculties possessed by animals are
due to the fact that they produce these poisons in themselves; if
they did not, they would have no intelligence at all. The human being
produces poisons -very similar to the animal poisons, especially in
organs situated near the head — but again in tiny quantities of
which the body can make use. If the poisons are produced too
vigorously there may, of course, be an excess of such animal poisons
in the organism. This is what happens, for example, in diphtheria.
Diphtheria is caused by animal poisons which have been produced by
the human being himself. Therefore diphtheria can be cured in a
similar way — by injecting the poison into an animal who can
resist it and then injecting the serum again into the human being. He
then has in his blood something that can fight the poison.

This shows you
that in nature there are not only useful but also injurious
substances ... those that are injurious, however, also have their
function. Mineral poisons are the same, essentially, as that with
which, in a less potent form, man's ether body has to be
dealing all the time. Plant poisons are the same as that with which
the astral body has to be dealing all the time; and animal poisons
are the same as that with which the “I” has to be dealing
all the time. We can therefore say: Poisoning is going on in some
degree all the time a man is awake — while he is asleep too
— but this poisoning contains its own antidotes. The gist of
the matter is that poisons and non-poisons alike must be present in
nature in order that the whole economy of nature may go forward in
the right way.

Now
you will realise why I said (in a previous lecture) that the presence
of formic acid is
indispensable. Formic acid is being sent out into nature all the time
from the ant-hills. Formic acid is present everywhere. The human
being produces his formic acid himself, but nature needs the ants who
produce and send out the formic acid. And if this formic acid were
not produced, our earth could never be revitalised — it would
simply die away.

In
a human corpse there is a poison known as the virus of dead bodies.
But in reality man has around him all the time a corpse that is producing
poison. A corpse yields this particular virus and the physical body
of a living man yields it too, but in the latter case the ether body,
astral body and “I” are at work. These higher members are
occupied all the time with this nascent poison; they absorb it
as sustenance. If the corpse did not contain poison the living human
being would not, in the real sense, be man. You will
realise from this that when a man dies, something must have
gone away from him, namely, the super-sensible members of his being.
When the super-sensible members have departed, the poison is no longer
destroyed; it remains. If, therefore, people were able to think
correctly about why corpse-virus arises, they would say: the physical
body has always produced this poison; there is no possible reason why
it should not do so, for as physical body it is the same, no
matter whether the man is dead or alive. But the super-sensible man
who needs the poison for sustenance, has departed, and therefore the poison
remains. This indicates how the super-sensible man is incorporated in
the physical, in the material man. Modern science, however, for lack
of proper thinking, cannot grasp it.

That, then, is
what observation of the way in which poisons work can teach us as a
general principle. It also shows us that when we are looking for a
medicament in a case of illness, we must ask ourselves: How, exactly,
does it work? If we notice that the astral body cannot work as it
ought, is not in proper control of the physical and etheric bodies,
it is necessary, in certain circumstances, to give the person a very
tiny quantity of arsenic because that strengthens the astral body. If
the “I” is not working properly, gout or rheumatism
appear, because the “I” is too weak to dissolve the
foodstuffs and then they make their way into the blood as foreign
bodies. If in a case of gout or rheumatism we discover that this is
what is happening, we must proceed to strengthen the “I.”
This can be done by administering the right dose of insect poison. If
a man is stung by a bee the same thing is achieved in a natural way
and he may be cured.

In
order to acquire a real knowledge of medicaments or remedies, we must ask:
How does nature work upon the “I”? How does nature work upon
the astral body? How does nature work upon the ether body? It is
precisely by understanding super-sensible nature that we
develop a knowledge of medicaments.

So you see,
science in any domain really depends upon recognition of the
super-sensible being of man.